Tax return documents are received from many different sources such as an employer, partnership, investment firm, charity, and so on. These documents may be forwarded to a tax preparer who prepares an income tax return for an individual or a business. Once the income tax return has been completed, the tax preparer can check the income tax return for accuracy and completeness by reviewing and cross-referencing the tax return documents. However, this task may be burdensome and difficult because the tax preparer has to look through every single tax return document to check the accuracy and completeness of each entry in the income tax return. Also, this task is time consuming because the review process is performed without having any cross-reference documents or numbers.
Alternatively, the tax preparer can manually write in a cross-reference number for each entry in the income tax return; however, this task is also very burdensome, difficult and time consuming because the tax preparer may have to write in dozens of cross-reference numbers. Furthermore, this task may need to be redone each time a change is made to the income tax return. Also, this task may need to be updated each time another tax return document is submitted by the individual or business.
Accordingly, it should be appreciated that there is a need for a system and method for creating cross-reference links, tables and lead sheets for tax return documents in an automated fashion to increase the efficiency of checking the accuracy and completeness of income tax returns. The invention fulfills this need as well as others.